Life is riddled with a procession of minor impediments

[paddykafka]

If it's not in bad taste, you could direct her to the story in the link below. It might give her pause for thought, a chance to reflect on what she's doing and maybe change her hoarding ways.

http://www.independent.ie/world-news/americas/hoarder-missing-for-two-months-found-mummified-under-pile-of-rubbish-29200282.html

It's a long shot, I know, but hope it's of some help to you both. (And I speak as someone with a bit of a hoarding habit myself!)

Cheers!

[staticgirl]

This kind of hoarding starts when there is some kind of underlying emotional problem from a person's past which means they cannot let go, or they are scared to. Obviously older people who were subjected to the trauma of WW2 and the instructions from the government to 'make, do and mend' have an awful time because in their mind, their refusal to stop saving things has been officially sanctioned.

We have tendencies in our family and it is nearly always because the person concerned doesn't want to admit that time has passed, or they don't want to look at things which remind them of someone who they miss or who hurt them. They may have once been appallingly hard up and can't get over the idea that they are comfortable and safe enough to chuck things now and could buy replacements later if they made a mistake.

I occasionally start doing it myself and then blitz everything when I'm feeling better again. Luckily my downtimes don't last so long nowadays.

[Rog69]

That's an interesting point, My wife's Mother grew up as part of a big family who had very little when they were kids just after WW2 and you can see signs of hoarding all down that side of her family, its almost as though once it starts it becomes a gene that is passed down the generations.

Her Mum is pretty bad but my Father i Law keeps it in check quite well, my Sister in law is even worse than my wife and she has an Uncle (Mum's Brother) who lives in Canada that would be a candidate for one of those TV shows.

[Hawkmumbler]

Where do people draw the line between "Collecting" and "Hoarding"? 

[radiator]

I think for my girlfriend its more out of laziness/an almost pathological hatred of sorting and organising. She once put off buying a new phone for over a year, even though her current one was falling apart and needed to be charged twice a day - PURELY because she couldn't face the prospect of entering in all of her numbers to a new phone. Madness.

Having said that, she does seem to place sentimental value on the weirdest things.

I feel like I may have oversold the problem as I was more narked than usual when I posted. The problem isn't that bad really, I just sometimes suspect that she shows early signs of these worrying tendencies.

[TordelBack]

I feel like I may have oversold the problem as I was more narked than usual when I posted. The problem isn't that bad really, I just sometimes suspect that she shows early signs of these worrying tendencies.

Catching up on this thread, I regret to report that both my wife and I suffer from these 'tendencies'.  Early in our relationship I had thought that it was my bad influence (e.g. 24 years on, I retain the tag from a box of Roses that we shared on our first 'date', tied to a cork net float found while scavenging driftwood from our first beach bonfire... and it doesn't stop there... I have the tickets to every single museum and attraction I've ever visited, and since they started printing the names of the film, every cinema ticket), since her parents' house was a temple to white-brick minimalism, until I chanced to open a random cupboard there and discovered that every single concealed space in the building was crammed to bursting with every variety of kipple, indicating a combined genetic/upbringing component.

I have got a bit better since I now spend the majority of my days in the house, but I still cannot suffer a piece of scrap wood or computer hardware to be discarded: a behaviour that is tragically reinforced every time I discover I have 'the very thing for that'. 

[Noisybast]

It was only after a lot of soul-searching that I recently tossed out about 85% of the contents of my Big Bag of Cables. Obviously, since then I've needed (and no longer owned) a VGA lead and a 56k modem cable.

[TordelBack]

Obviously, since then I've needed (and no longer owned) a VGA lead and a 56k modem cable.

See? See?

My worst affliction in this regard is my Giant Box of Old Glues.  You never know when you'll need a flexible epoxy with good lateral strength that dries clear.

[Rog69]

Well, if we are talking about big boxes of cables then I am guilty as charged too, I'm just looking up at mine as it sits on the big shelf above me and it's like a bloody snake's wedding in there.

I do have a rule though, if I can't get the lid on the box when I add something then I have to throw something else away.

[Spikes]

No second trip to Wembley, and non league footie, again, next season.

[Albion]

Burnt a CD of three songs for a funeral today and it killed my CD/DVD writer!

[HdE]

I am INCREDIBLY pissed off today.

Some of you guys may have seen me post about this on Facebook.

A few weeks back, we got a visit from some guys in a South West Water van, who informed us that there was a 'major issue' with the waterworks under the block of properties where myself and my ailing grandmother live.

the 'issue' was a massive leak in the pipeworks. However, the pipework is so convoluted and badly maintained that there is apparently no way to ascertain the source of the leak.

It quickly became clear that all South West Water were interested in was finding out who to bill for the gallons of water being lost every day.

TODAY, two letters from South West Water, one addressed to my grandma, and one addressed to the couple running the shop below her flat, revealed EXACTLY who they intended to charge.

The shop has been stuck with a £1,000 bill, while my gran has been stuck for £899.

Except... water rates are supposed to be inclusive of her rent.

There is NO FRIGGIN' WAY this bill is getting paid. So, instead, we look forward to the inevitable wrangle between the water provider, the landlord, the agents... and it all smacks of somebody being pressured into finding someone to bill ASAP.

NOT impressed.

[TordelBack]

The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things:
Of shoes, and ships, and sealing-wax, and motherdrokking banks.

So we're behind in our mortgage, yeah yeah sing me that old number, and we've been begging thm for some sort of interest-only deal while we find our feet, but there's a queue and they're considering our appeal, and they'll get back to us, and all the while the arrears and the charges grow, and then out of the blue, instead of giving us an answer, the bank send this thug-in-a-suit debt collector from a collections agency guy round, all unannounced like. 

To my house.

So I say, how do I know this guy is a real guy, seeing as the bank has spent a lot of its time and my money telling me !beware! it will never contact me unsolicited, or through a third party, and this here is both.  All he has is an unaddressed, unsigned, generic lump of boilerplate on some laser-printed letterhead telling me he is who he says he is.  You might say I'm being disingenuous here, and you might be right, but I've had a lot of dealings with collections from both side, and I know they/we thrive on attention, and this the first peep out the Bank in months and it's not even them so feck it.

So I ignore the guy and write to the Asst Manager who has previously been our mortgage person but seems to be ignoring me now, to ask is this guy a guy and what happened man you used to be cool?  Nothing.  So the guy comes back, and I write again.  Nothing.  So I call my branch, and no-one that will answer a phone has ever heard of their Asst Manager, who apparently left at some point over the last few months.  So I explain my situation, and ask who I should speak to now, so they give me a name, but she isn't in, so I write to her.  And nothing.  And the guy comes back, and I write again, and nothing.

Then, halleluljah!  The fifth trumpet sounds! And lo, a letter from the bank arrives!  They do exist!  They do remember me!

And I crack the wax and hold my breath, and.

It's a form letter telling me how much more I now owe every month, because they've increased the variable rate even as the ECB rate has been reduced.

"Oh oysters," said the Carpenter, "You've had a pleasant run!"
"Shall we be trotting home again?", but answer came there none.
And this was hardly odd, because they'd eaten every one.

Ah I feel better with that off my chest.

TL;DR: WANKERS, ombudsman, bah!

[Banners]

We had nasty threatening letters from nPower and their bailiffs which were terrifying enough, but I can't imagine how scary it must have been to have had a debt collector at your door. You're one of the good guys, TB - I hope it all works out for your home and your family,

(As an aside, nPower recalculated and ended up applying £6.24 credit, so it was complete bollocks all along).

[TordelBack]

Ah, just venting my frustration really, which did the trick oh virtual confessors - I've dealt with sheriffs and bailiffs in the business world, so I'm not that bothered beyond the rudeness of it all.  It seems like almost unimaginable stupidity that a bailed-out bank could afford to commission a third party to go door-to-door seeking blood from a stone, but can't manage to notify us in advance, or tell us that our regular contact over several years has left the company, or answer ANY of their correspondence over a 5 month period.  No wonder they effectively went bust, any business that carried on that way would.